Loyal pirates
Here’s LRN4 with one of her fellow pirates. That’s LRN4 there on the right. She’s the one with both legs. Also hands. But no beard. Great Art courtesy of the exclusive iPhone 4S-cam, taken in Maui on our recent cruise, and part of my famous Statue and Vacation series.
Greetings from the New Fortress of Solitude East (NFOS)! That’s right, I’m in Newtown. This is my second week, in fact. Never got around to posting last week. Sorry about that, Loyal Readers.
It’s the New Fortress of Solitude because I’m all by myself. Poor me. My TDY hasn’t been approved by the cast of thousands on the signature list yet, so I’m just coming out a week or two at a time on business travel. Makes it a bit lonesome, although I do have plenty of time to myself. The moment of silence lasts all evening long. I’ll be home in Lardville next week, working in Sunnyvale, and on holiday the following week. Come January 3rd, I’m back here for a three-week stint. LRN4 will be joining me for that one. Hopefully, the TDY will kick in after that and we can start looking for more permanent quarters. Although I’m really enjoying the Residence Inn. It’s just too small for the long term. Also too expensive. But a very nice place to stay.
I have a Ford Crown Victoria as my rental car this week. I have always liked big cars, and I had hoped I would like this one. It is indeed large, although the interior isn’t really roomy by current standards. It’s moderately comfortable and handles okay. The big V8 engine doesn’t seem all that powerful, though. Also, there’s no Sirius radio or steering wheel radio controls. And it just seems so … dated. Last week, I had a Ford Flex and thoroughly enjoyed it. I’ll be fine with the Crown Vic the rest of this week, but I hope I don’t get another one. Blasts from the past should probably stay in the past.
Besides, the car has over 14,000 miles on it. That’s pretty ancient for a rental car.
Speaking of cars, LRN4 sold the Honda last week. She’s the best salesperson I know. I’ll miss it, but it was time to let it go. I’m happy with my Taurus.
I’m certainly cranking up the airline miles and the hotel nights again. Hotel nights especially. Will have ten nights this month and I’m scheduled for another 17 next month already. And there will undoubtedly be more after that. The Marriott people are going to LOVE me! Even though I’m going 2500 miles each way, though, I’m still not traveling enough for the airline miles to amount to a hill of beans. Not like when I was going to Europe week in and week out ten years ago, racking up 20,000 miles a month. Those were the good bad old days!
Anyway. I’m enjoying the job. It’s all quite new, so it’s a bit of a struggle to learn everything I need to know to be productive, but that will come. I’ll also get to know the people, which I’m looking forward to. They seem like good folks. And east coast people just dress better than their counterparts in the west. I don’t exactly know why they do, but it suits me just fine.
Heard from LRN1 today, rather than yesterday. They had a Monday conference with their mission president and didn’t get to write until today. We’re almost exactly two months away from the day he comes home! I’m getting really excited to have him back. And it’ll be fun to spend a couple of months together before he’s back to school.
It’s past time for me to get to bed, so I’ll leave my Loyal Readers with this shocking food violence news: spaghetti spat!
See you tomorrow.
December 15th, 2011 at 9:16 am
And all this time I thought spaghetti was for eating! If you are in the NFOS where am I?
December 15th, 2011 at 10:23 am
The OFOS, of course.
December 24th, 2011 at 4:58 pm
It WAS kind of lonely here while you were in the NFOS.